Who Gets the Cookies.

Imagine a classroom where at snack time 5 children sit at a table and the teacher brings out 10 cookies.  Three of the children get 3 cookies each and the other two split one.  Over time the 2 children who had to share that single cookie are getting a cookie each and there is talk that one day get 2 whole cookies.  The children who used to get 3 cookies each are angry and saying that the other children are changing the way things have been done and it is not fair that they have to give something up.  This is what I see our American culture like today.

As the Christmas season is ending for most, we once again were exposed to a lie that somehow since the current President was elected people are free to say Merry Christmas.  To be clear saying that phrase has never been banned by anyone in government nor has there been any real attempt to eliminate it from our language.  A few retail companies did start using Happy Holidays and Season's Greetings in ads and for employees when speaking to customers they didn't know.  But from the halls of Congress and the White House the phrase Merry Christmas was a common greeting every December for as long as I can remember.  But there have been more and more communities that have begun to acknowledge, either by legal decree or growing awareness, that they are more diverse than just Christians.   The changing of forcing children, for example, at school programs to attend events with Santa or sing songs about the birth of Jesus when that is not their faith tradition has been met with anger in some circles.  Like the kids who lost their cookie advantage there are some suggesting that their Christmas is ruined.  When in fact that there is nothing ruined.  Christmas season starts earlier and earlier each year.  There is no lack of Christmas opportunity for people around the country.  But the very inclusion of other traditions in that space has been almost exclusively Christmas has some people riled up.  Without a thought of what it must be like for a child who doesn't celebrate Christmas forced to either spend class time learning Christmas music and visiting with Santa or having to sit in the office these people feel that their children are being cheated.  This sense of privilege is a problem that many in government are now promoting by repeating the lies of the President. 

Religion is only one arena where this privilege but one that we have seen take the forefront.  A recent viral video of a woman, standing in front of a mosque in Brooklyn, saying "this is Brooklyn" astonished that she can hear the call to prayer.  The fairly quiet broadcast to the neighborhood (compared to some I have heard in some places) did not seem to have a rejection from most of the people walking down the street, but for her it was somehow a problem.  This feeds the old creeping Sharia nonsense.  Muslims have been part of our country since before we were a country.  But demonizing their existence is part of a bigger picture.  While church bells can be heard for miles why can't the few minutes a day of a call to prayer can be broadcast?  Because it makes some people uncomfortable. 

This problem is growing in our country.  Some people don't want to make room for others to join the table and get the cookies.  This has been part of our country's history.  We had grown past it I thought.  But today I am in shock, after several attacks of Jews in the New York City area in recent weeks after a couple of years of murders in synagogues in Pittsburgh and San Diego and Los Angeles and and and a man walked into a house of a rabbi and stabbed several people.  This is a form of terrorism that is intended, by all accounts, to force Jews out of the public eye.  Maybe even out of a community.  That is a serious issue and if we keep saying that the kinds of things coming from members of the right wing this will get worse. 

Diversity is our strength.  We can't marginalize groups because some feel they are losing their seat of supremacy.  We need to learn to share and add to our great American culture.  It is a deep seated value we have had from the beginning.  We may not have always lived up to that standard but we can't stop trying.  Everyone should have access to the cookies.  

When Impeachment is Just Another Wednesday

It is Wednesday, December 18, 2019 and the third President of the United States in the history of our Republic will be impeached by the House of Representatives by the end of the day.  While it seems like a major event for many as the media has unending coverage and there were protests in the street, somehow it doesn't seem at all to be anything special in this Presidency.  In fact it simply feels like the cliffhanger at the end of a season of a TV drama where the main character has acted badly throughout and the question is will this when he is held accountable.  This is in part because it feels like every day for the past 3 years we have had to think about the President of the United States, and not in a good way.  I get asked, often, "did the President do anything today?".  A question of preparation for perhaps watching an evening news program.  We have become programmed to wonder what the person in what is the most powerful seat in the world is doing and hoping that it is for the greater good and not otherwise.  Because of this impeachment, a solemn and sober act to remove the leader of the country, is just another event in a string of events around this President. 

 Just think about this, last week or so the President of the United States was ordered to pay $2 million to charities because he defrauded them prior to his election, he wrote a 6 page rant to Speaker of the House Pelosi full of insults and lies (and spelling errors) on White House Letterhead that looks more like a chain email forwarded without comment, his personal lawyer went on television to tell the world that he in fact helped oust a career anti-corruption ambassador because she was in the way, and of course tweeted 100 times in a single day attacking everyone who cares to question his actions. 

Our new normal is to assume the President of the United States will do something outside the bounds of typical behavior for a chief executive and well it is Trump being Trump.  That is a problem.  You may be happy that he is putting unqualified ideologues on the Federal bench to make it more conservative and less about law, with an economy that continued to grow during his Presidency, at least for many sectors and it may make you feel good that he expresses those dark thoughts you have out loud about minorities and immigrants.  But the current environment is not healthy for America, and if you can't see that I understand.  A fish does not know it is wet.  But I hope people will seriously take a look at what is going on around us. The President has been moving more and more into the role of a tyrant where he no longer believes in the rule of law, the Constitution and the functional norms of our country.   When Elizabeth Willing Powel asked Ben Franklin about our new Constitution he answered,  "We have a Republic, if we can keep it."  A President who doesn't care about American values and norms is a threat to keeping it.  This may be a tyrant that you like, but all tyrants eventually find fault with everyone, and when they do I hope we are all here to stand against it.